Much Madness
by Pearl127
Summary: Much madness is divinest sense, to a discerning eye. Inspired by an Emily Dickinson poem of the same name.


_Much Madness is divinest Sense –  
To a discerning Eye – _

The young Ozian sat at a secluded table outside the corner café where he worked, nursing a mug of tea. He was on his mid-morning break and was taking the opportunity to down a late breakfast, almost lunch, and thumb through the newspaper he'd found on the seat, abandoned by an earlier customer.

He flipped through a few pages in the middle before he realized this was an old paper, one he'd already read. He discarded it on the table and set his mug down on it for a make-shift coaster before reaching over to the nearest table to retrieve another – this one was from today.

He never cared much for the headline stories or even most of the front section. It was all about famous, far-off people and their scandalous exploits for which he held very little interest. What he really wanted to read was the local news, about people he knew or at least about something tangible and relevant. He had already peeled back the top corner of the front page to flip past to the local section, when the bold print on the front page caught his eye.

"WICKED WITCH CONTINUES TO TERRORIZE OZ"

The photo below the headline hogged nearly half the page and boasted a dramatic caption below that read "The hunt for the Wicked Witch continues." It depicted a middle-aged woman with undeniably harsh features and a hint of a snarl or a smirk on her lips. Her nose and chin were comically prominent, the former of which sported a large wart on its right side. Her eyes were hidden in the shadow cast by her wide-brimmed hat, adding to the mysterious effect.

The young man chuckled at the absurdity of it all. He saw at once that this was not a photo at all but a skillfully done painting. They didn't even have an actual photo of "the Witch," and they expected to pass off this caricature as an accurate representation. It was almost laughable. That is, it would have been laughable if it hadn't been slightly sickening.

He recognized the story. He'd followed it with mild interest over the past few days when it had been buried several pages in, and he found its spotlight position alarming. He'd come to the conclusion early on in his reading that this was all a load of bull. Couldn't the rest of Oz see the obvious lie?

Apparently not.

He skimmed the rest of the article out of curiosity and found himself growing both more alarmed and more angry as he went on. There wasn't a scrap of concrete evidence in the whole thing. It was all "cursed green skin" this and "evil spirit" that, but nothing specific of which she was being accused.

He spun around in his chair and snatched the out-dated newspaper off the neighboring table, flipping back several pages to find the previous article. He lined them up and skimmed for details – they didn't even match! The newer article contradicted its predecessor on several accounts. First the witch was an inconvenient dissenter, now she was a dangerous felon with no specified crime to speak of.

He glanced up from his reading when a sudden commotion in the street disturbed the peace of the morning.

_Much Sense - the starkest Madness –_  
'_Tis the Majority_

The Witch Hunters had been moving in waves through the city over the past few days. Every once in a while he'd see another pack of them, collecting members and plotting their charge on the witch's lair, but they inevitably died out with time, and no one had actually tried to raid the castle. He still thought it was a load of bull, but when one came looking for support today, he decided to follow. Curiosity surrounding the subject won out and he figured at the very least he'd know something more about this mysterious Witch with whom he instinctively sympathized for reasons unknown even to himself.

This time they were really doing it – they were going to Kiamo Ko and they were going to kill the Witch. The young man found himself startlingly alarmed. What would he do if they really did kill her? He couldn't be counted among them. Even if they went unpunished (and he assumed they would), his conscience couldn't take it, having stood there and done nothing.

But he followed, blindly. Out of curiosity only, he told himself, but he was going blindly.

The mob was as a living thing, breathing, seething with anger. Its individual members blended into one such that he could scarcely discern one individual from the other. It was a blur of screams and curses of frightening magnitude that surged through the city, expanding and growing.

He was swept along with them, even though a small voice in the back of his head told him to get out now, while he still could. Before he could act upon it, the monster around him stopped, and there was a figure before them.

_In this, as All, prevails –  
Assent – and you are sane – _

"My fellow Ozians."

Thank Goodness – Glinda! Certainly the Good Witch of the North would see reason. She of all people could stop this foolishness.

"As terrifying as terror is," she continued, "I ask you to please assuage your anger for a brief moment only."

There was restlessness in the crowd. Surely they wouldn't go against _Glinda?_

"I assure you, the Wizard is well aware of the menacing danger of the Witch and is doing his best to choose the proper course of action. If you only wait a bit longer, I'm sure –"

But they cut her off. "We've BEEN waiting! When is the Wizard going to DO something? Why don't you DO something?"

He was appalled at the blatant disrespect and awaited the commanding reproach from Glinda. A person couldn't just _say _something like that and get away with it. This was the single most prominent figure in Oz, second only to the Wizard.

There was a moment of silence, and the Good Witch seemed to be choosing her words carefully. "I understand your alarm, good sir, and I know that the crimes of the Witch may be unforgivable, but if you'll just see reason for a moment –"

There was a general uproar. Cries of "What about our children?!" and "How does he expect us to wait any longer?" were everywhere, and Glinda seemed to be losing her resolve.

"Fellow Ozians." Her tone was more urgent now. "Please realize the Wizard is doing all he can. I'm sure he knows best and will –" but she was cut off – again! – by the cries of the mob. The young, unwilling dissenter was growing more and more afraid. He wondered if there were any other casual observers silently rooting for Glinda and prayed urgently that one of them would speak up. One against one hundred, even one such as Glinda, was never a fair fight.

_Demur – you're straightway dangerous –  
And handled with a Chain – _

The mob was pushing through and Glinda was giving in. The lack of justice was so infuriating, that before he knew what he was saying, the young Ozian was on a table, yelling at the crowd.

"Quiet! All of you! Don't you realize we don't even know what she's done? See reason for a minute will you?!"

The crowd quieted for a moment, and a few of them seemed to take what he said into actual consideration, but they soon turned against him, crying all the while that he'd been brainwashed by the Witch herself, and was no more than a spy. He glanced quickly at Glinda and found her watching him and biting her lip. It was the most obvious display of panic and worry he'd ever seen from the usually calm and collected woman and it frightened him. The Good Witch had always given him the impression that she knew more than she let on, and now more than ever, she seemed to be struggling with a grave secret. Wasn't this obvious to anyone else?

Apparently not.

After their brief lull, the crowd turned on him in full force, and he stepped down from the table, backing away quickly. When he looked to Glinda again, she seemed to have regained some of her composure and was trying, in vain, to restore order. The young man hurried away. It was clear they weren't going to listen to reason, no matter how hard he, Glinda, or anyone else tried. He wasn't stupid – this wasn't his fight. He didn't even know this woman, and if Glinda couldn't do anything, what was he expected to do?

So he ran away, burning with shame at being so easily defeated. It would be alright, he told himself, Glinda and the Wizard would make the people of Oz calm down. With a little luck, all this would be settled in a few days.

But he knew it was a lie, and when the following day's newspaper betrayed what he already knew – the Witch was dead.


End file.
